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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25275220">Rolled Over</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoniWritesStuff/pseuds/JoniWritesStuff'>JoniWritesStuff</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Magnificent Ambersons - Booth Tarkington</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Car Accident, Edwardian Period, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, booth tarkington, the hurt comfort is canon, two broken legs</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-04-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 08:35:18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,773</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25275220</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoniWritesStuff/pseuds/JoniWritesStuff</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>What Lucy Morgan said to George Minafer in the hospital after his accident.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>George Minafer &amp; Fanny Minafer, George Minafer/Lucy Morgan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I moved to Indianapolis in the late Nineties for college, and one of the things I did was try to read a bunch of books by local authors. Booth Tarkington was one of them, and he's almost totally unknown today despite winning the Pulitzer Prize twice - something hardly anyone has done! 'The Magnificent Ambersons' is loosely set in Indianapolis (specifically the Woodruff Place neighborhood, which is GORGEOUS)  and deals with the rise of the automotive industry - which is STILL a really big deal around here. </p><p>The first time I read this book I thought it was good but the ending was sad; when I re-read it a few years ago I decided the ending is actually perfect. It's bittersweet, but I do really love a bittersweet ending. George loses almost everything he's ever had, but he gains himself, and in the end I think that's a good trade-off.</p><p>It kind of annoys me that a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel is totally overshadowed by the Orson Welles adaptation, when it's a really good book in its own right. There was another adaptation in the early 2000's that did a great job with the dialogue (because most of it was lifted straight from the book) but the scenery was all wrong - they had HILLS. Guys, I love Indiana but this state is as flat as a pancake!!!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>"The city had rolled over his heart, burying it under, as it rolled over the Major's and buried it under. The city had rolled over the Ambersons and buried them under to the last vestige... Georgie Minafer had got his come-upance, but the people who had so longed for it were not there to see it, and they never knew it. Those who were still living had forgotten all about it and all about him." </span>
</p><p>
  <span>- The Magnificent Ambersons, Chapter 33</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He was asleep when Lucy came in. It was strange to see him so still; in her memories he was always in motion.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Fanny had told Lucy everything, over cups of weak coffee that morning, beginning with the full extent of her nephew’s injuries. It wasn’t just the broken legs: the whole right side of his body had taken the brunt of the impact, leaving him with cracked ribs and a dislocated shoulder, traumatized internal organs, and a bruise on his hip the size of a dinner plate. Then, once the floodgates were open, Fanny told her young visitor everything about the last two years. How George had given up his chance at the law in order to keep her in genteel comfort; how he’d been replacing her dishes, one or two at a time, with the pattern the salesgirl at Ayres had sworn was the most fashionable. She told how he’d been a surprising comfort to her in his strange taciturn way – how the thought of life without him left Fanny rudderless and adrift. Lucy had heard bits and pieces of rumor, but only Fanny Minafer could tell the whole story, for she was the only one that knew it. Lucy had been disinclined to believe the snatches of gossip she’d caught on the wind, but Fanny she knew to be incapable of guile; in light of hard evidence there was only one conclusion to be drawn: that Georgie Minafer was a new man.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That the new man was out of physical danger was much less certain, or so Lucy was told by the garrulous orderly who showed her to his door. He could take pneumonia, or one of his legs could go gangrene; he could tear through his stitches and exsanguinate – Lucy smiled brightly, and closed the door in his face. She looked long and hard at George, then. She hadn’t laid eyes on him in six long years, excluding a veiled glimpse at his mother’s funeral, and the Major’s. Though she had long since burned his photographs, his visage was seared into her memory – but her image of him was no longer accurate. The youthful softness of his face had given way to hard planes; there were lines around his eyes and mouth and a furrow sunk between his dark brows that hadn’t been there before. Still, Lucy thought, the arrangement was not altogether unpleasant; in fact, she found she rather preferred it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The bed took up most of the room, with only a chair and a little table besides. There was a window which looked out on a series of belching smokestacks; the room was devoid of a single ornament, and Lucy vowed before she came again she’d plunder the choicest spoils from her garden. Both of the patient’s legs were encased in thick plaster and suspended from the ceiling on chains. His right arm and shoulder were bound and immobilized, and the neck of his dressing-gown was open, with the suggestion of bandages beyond. The dressing-gown was a plain one of gray flannel, and at that, Lucy almost laughed. The Georgie she had once known would have scorned so utilitarian a garment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had no intention of waking him, and had prepared herself for such an eventuality; she had Gene Stratton-Porter’s latest book, <em>At the Foot of the Rainbow</em>, and infinite patience. After two and a half chapters George began to stir; five pages more and he was frankly staring at her, apparently warring with himself as to whether the young lady in question was an apparition or the real thing. She was dressed not in white today, but a smart suit of dove gray, with a blue Juliet cap pulled low over her shining curls. She did not speak, but met his questing gaze without a trace of coyness or shame.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Miss Morgan,” he said at length. His voice was sandpaper rough, and the line between his brows had deepened. “How – how long have you been here?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“About thirty pages,” she said with a smile, turning down the corner of the page to mark her place. “Hardly any time at all. What can I do for you, George? I mean to be useful.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He allowed her to crank up the head of his bed, and pour him a glass of water from the little pitcher at his elbow, but he suffered her to go no further. That he could scarcely manage the glass was evident; Lucy took the opportunity to look out the window, loudly exclaiming on the view, while he endeavored to slake his thirst using only his unaccustomed left hand, which was shaking rather badly besides. When she turned back, the glass was empty, and if the gray flannel was damp, she kept her own counsel.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why –"  he began. His hand made a fist in the bedclothes, and he glared at the ceiling. “Why are you here?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve been to see your aunt,” Lucy said gently. “She thought – rather, I thought, and she agreed – perhaps it would do you good.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It certainly can’t do me any</span>
  <em>
    <span> harm</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” George agreed, still with a thunderous gaze directed toward the ceiling. Lucy wondered what the cracked plaster had done to raise his ire. “Only if you see Aunt Fanny again, I wish you’d tell her –“</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That this business of a private room is nonsense. I’ve been telling anyone who will listen, that I belong in the public ward, not here, only Fanny must’ve gotten to them first!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And what is wrong with this room?” Lucy enquired. “It’s a little bare, but –"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, the cost, for one,” George said without a trace of self-consciousness. “It’s too expensive for – for the sort of person I am now. And it’s too quiet.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Too quiet?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You see,” he said, “after all that time in the explosives factory, I've gotten used to the din.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Would you allow me to visit,” Lucy said, smiling slyly, “if I promise to raise a racket?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But you won’t be coming back, after today. Haven’t you satisfied your curiosity?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“George Amberson Minafer! Do you believe I came here only to gawk?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course,” he went on relentlessly, “to be sure and see it for yourself – and your father, too, I suppose – that wicked old Georgie Minafer got what he had coming at last.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She opened her mouth, and closed it, and opened it again. “Do you think so little of me,” she said in a low dangerous voice, “that I would come here to gloat over your misfortune?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” he answered desperately, “only it reflects on my character, not yours!” A sudden movement must have jostled one of his many broken bones; he closed his eyes and contorted his pale face against the onslaught of pain. When it was over, he went on mercilessly. “I deserve every inch of this. You needn’t pretend otherwise.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I thought you knew me better than that,” Lucy retorted. “I don’t gain an ounce of pleasure from anyone’s misfortune. Least of all yours.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He met her gaze for a moment – his countenance tormented, hers full of righteous indignation – and then his face crumpled. “I didn’t mean that,” he said roughly. “I didn’t mean to call you – to suggest that you – Won’t you forgive me, Lucy?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was the first time he had spoken her name in six years. She hadn’t realized how long she’d been waiting. “There is nothing to forgive, George, dear.” Lucy reached across and took his free hand in both of her own. “Don’t give it another thought.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>While they were thus engaged, the door clicked open and a white-capped nurse sailed into the room. Lucy withdrew her hand, but not before giving George’s an encouraging squeeze. The nurse didn’t have any time for such nonsense, performing her duties with crisp efficacy while Lucy was conspicuously absorbed in her book.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your pulse is up,” the nurse pronounced. “Your temperature. too.” She scoured Lucy with an accusing glare; Lucy smiled like a Madonna in return. “You haven’t been </span>
  <em>
    <span>exciting</span>
  </em>
  <span> him, have you, Miss?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good heavens, no,” Lucy protested, the very picture of innocence. “I’m merely an old friend - a </span>
  <em>
    <span>very</span>
  </em>
  <span> old friend.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The nurse snorted, unconvinced, but at least she left them, for the moment, blessedly alone. “You needn't lie on </span>
  <em>
    <span>my</span>
  </em>
  <span> behalf,” George told Lucy. “I don’t mean to take advantage - you needn’t pity me, or think you’re beholden to me, on account of a few stolen kisses when we were children!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We <em>were</em> children,” Lucy agreed, “but we aren’t any longer - I’m twenty-nine, you know, and you’re twenty-eight. It’s been a decade since we first danced together, and sometimes it feels like longer, and sometimes it feels like no time at all. At any rate, I’m old enough to know my own mind, and if I’ve decided that you and I are to be friends, you’d be wise not to argue!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>George chuckled in spite of himself, low and deep in his throat, and the unexpectedness of it was strangely pleasing to Lucy’s ears. But in the next moment he winced again. “I could still die, you know,” he said morosely. “They’ve been very clear about that. So you’d be wise not to get too attached.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You won’t,” Lucy said, not appearing the least bit concerned.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I won’t?” One side of George’s mouth quirked upwards.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I </span>
  <em>
    <span>expressly</span>
  </em>
  <span> forbid it,” she said haughtily, “and I think you’ll find I’m used to having my own way. So you might as well give in sooner rather than later.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He looked at her strangely, searching for any trace of irony in her face or her tone, and finding none. He still hadn’t made up his own mind whether he wanted to live or die, but the memory of the grim pronouncements of the doctors who had examined him seemed to fade a bit in the glow of Lucy’s optimism. “Is there anything else I should know?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I plan to visit as often as you’ll allow me,” Lucy said briskly. “As for the rest of the waking hours – I’ll bring you books, or magazines, or whatever you’d like to read.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No good,” George answered morosely. “My head aches too much for reading, and anyway, my glasses were lost in the smash-up.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t know you wore glasses.” Lucy tilted her head at him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I don’t any </span>
  <em>
    <span>more</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Then I’ll read to you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I might not stay awake.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Then I’ll read to </span>
  <em>
    <span>myself</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” Lucy said, holding aloft her book. The movement caused her watch-face to catch in the sun, and she turned her wrist over and looked at it. “Heavens!” Lucy said with some alarm. “Is that the time - </span>
  <em>
    <span>already</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t ask <em>me</em>,” George told her, “I’m not even sure what day it is.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s Tuesday,” Lucy replied, “and it’s four-thirty in the afternoon - Father’s train came in at four; I’ll suppose he’ll be here any minute!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your father -” George had gone three or four shades paler, and he was gasping like a hooked fish. “He’s coming - you asked him to come </span>
  <em>
    <span>here</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course not,” she said, “he’s been in New York on business, so I haven’t spoken to him in three or four days, but he will have figured it out, of course. I think he will have come straight here from the station, and not even stopped at the house, if I know him half so well as I think I do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why -” George started. He seemed almost if he was going to get up out of the bed, two broken legs be damned. “Why would he come -”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He knows about the accident, of course,” she went on. “I sent him a clipping, and anyway, he often reads the papers on the train.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>George laughed bitterly, and the tail end of it sounded almost like a sob. “Then it doesn’t matter that the car that ran me over didn’t kill me - your father’s going to finish the job!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t be absurd,” she snapped, “he’s only a man, after all!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No he’s not,” George said desperately, “he’s Eugene Morgan!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, he’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>my</span>
  </em>
  <span> father, and I don’t allow him to be unkind to anyone I’ve decided is my friend. And yes, that means you, George Minafer.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He relaxed a little, and allowed her to take his hand again. There were approaching footsteps in the hall. With Lucy on his side, things might just barely be tolerable.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“So,” Lucy said companionably while she sat dissecting an orange with her pen-knife. “Aren’t you going to ask me what I’ve been doing all these years?”</p><p>It had only been twenty-four hours and change since their reunion, but already Lucy had transformed the grim hospital room with a multitude of considerate touches. She’d sent over a small forest of flowers and greenery, a bright coverlet, and an enormous hamper of fruit; she’d also provided a stack of trade magazines pilfered from her own father’s study - and a new pair of glasses. Lucy was in a gown of pale yellow dimity, with a bunch of forget-me-nots at the waist, looking as much like a breath of Spring as it was possible for a person to be. </p><p>“No need.” George shook his head, and accepted an orange slice. Three days out from abdominal surgery, he couldn’t have anything substantial to eat, but the bit of fruit tasted like manna from heaven. “I read the papers, same as everyone else.” </p><p>“Do you, now.” Lucy was amused. “Why don’t you tell me what you’ve heard, and I’ll tell you if it’s true or not.”</p><p>If George was embarrassed by his forwardness, he hid it well. “Your garden is the envy of the entire north side, and you’re quite busy with your charity work - widows and orphans, that sort of thing.” He sucked his orange meditatively, then added, “I don’t mean to sound flip, Lucy. I admire you greatly. Certainly you’re doing more with your station in life than I ever did with mine.”</p><p>“You’ll have to see my garden, just as soon as we can get you up and about,” Lucy said. “Did you know, I’ve been tasked with developing a new rose varietal for the state centennial?”</p><p>“I did not.” He raised his orange slice in salute. “Furthermore, I check the society pages every Sunday, to see whether or not Mr. Eugene Morgan is pleased to announce the engagement of his daughter Lucy to a Mr. So-and-so, yet.”</p><p>Lucy threw her head back and laughed. “<em>Do </em>you, now.”</p><p>“Yes, and I’m sure it’s only a matter of time - perhaps this Sunday will see it done!”</p><p>Lucy passed him another wedge of orange. “And what if I told you there <em> was </em> no Mr. So-and-so?”</p><p>“Then I’d wonder what possessed the lads of the better class of people - if they’re fools or merely blind!”</p><p>Lucy laughed around her own bite of the orange. “Suppose I preferred it that way? If I’d rather be an old maid than hitch myself to one of those young bucks society is always throwing my way?”</p><p>George shrugged. “You’d get no judgement from me - I’ve no intention of marrying, either.” </p><p>“Then when we’re elderly, and I wear lace shawls and you’ve got a beard down to here -” Lucy pantomimed chin-whiskers at least two feet in length, eliciting a smile from George - “you’ll have to come and sit by my fireside, and we’ll have our rocking-chairs and you’ll smoke a pipe, and we’ll reminisce about the ‘good old days’!” </p><p>“You paint a pleasant enough picture,” George said, “but I’m sure you’ll have half-a-dozen grandchildren climbing on your knees - and you’ll spoil them within an inch of their lives!”</p><p>“Perhaps.” Lucy smiled like the Sphinx.  “Anyway, you’ve got the advantage of me - I’ve no way of knowing what you’ve been up to all these years, without asking.”</p><p>“I’ve stayed out of the papers - excluding the present situation. But haven’t you been visiting Fanny?”</p><p>If Lucy was surprised by the revelation, she did not show it. “Yes, but not very often - and anyway, we didn’t really talk about you, not until yesterday.”</p><p>“Really?” George peered at her. “Then what <em> did </em> you talk about?”</p><p>“Oh, this and that,” Lucy said airily. “She’s dreadfully proud of those dishes you’ve been buying  her - whatever gave you the idea?”</p><p>“All the dishes from the old place -” to Lucy’s surprise, he was able to say <em> the old place </em> without wincing - “were lost in a smash-up, right before we moved. So she was in need of new ones anyway. And I thought she ought to have something nice. She’s keeping house for me, you know, and I’m about the most dismal housemate a person could want.”</p><p>“You can’t be <em> that </em> bad.”</p><p>“Oh, then I <em> know </em> she hasn’t told you a thing about me,” George chuckled. “Poor Aunt Fanny has asked me nearly every night for two years if I won’t go in and take a hand at bridge with her, in the evening, and I haven’t joined her once! But still she asks - I think it’s gotten to be a habit; I don’t think either one of us would sleep at night, if she didn’t.” George smiled fondly - and Lucy, not forgetting the antagonism to which he had subjected his aunt, in his youth, smiled at the fondness.</p><hr/><p>George had other visitors too; he was well liked at Akers’, for all he kept to himself. They did not know, nor would they have cared, that he was an Amberson – they only knew he was a good honest worker, and a fair boss. The freckle-faced, jug-eared youth who served as George’s assistant fairly adored him. He didn’t know until much later, when it was too late to be embarrassed by it, that they’d passed the hat around to keep Fanny in room and board  - the exact charitable impulse predicted by Fred Kinney’s father, only it was done not by his old enemies but his new friends! </p><p>Four or five days in, they received a letter from George Amberson; Fanny sat at her nephew’s bedside and read the first of several densely typewritten pages. It was thick with excuses – his work in Washington was terribly busy this time of year, and he couldn’t possibly get away, and he was dreadfully sorry but he couldn’t spare Georgie more than five or ten dollars, which was hardly worth the cost to have it wired – George finally raised his hand and signalled Fanny to stop, which she was only too glad to do.</p><p>“I wasn’t –" said a red-faced George, “I wasn’t <em> asking him for money </em>!”</p><p>“I know you weren’t,” Fanny agreed, folding the letter into its original squares. “Perhaps I’ll just – we can finish reading this a bit later, when you’re feeling stronger.”</p><p>“Yes,” George agreed, “that would probably be best!” And he knew then that he would never have contact with his Uncle George again if he could help it. As for Fanny, she dropped the letter, envelope and all, in a dust-bin on her way out of the hospital that evening and never mentioned it again.</p><p>From Sydney and Amelia, though Fanny had wired them the same day of the disaster, they heard not a word.</p><p>Lucy leaned on her familial connections to effect a reconciliation with Fred Kinney. The latter, now balding and a father of two, left George with ribs sore from laughing and a standing invitation to dinner. Frank Bronson came too, looking infinitely more aged and stooped than he had two years before. His new apprentice, he lamented, had probably twice George's intellect but only one-half his vigor. Bronson would have preferred the proportion be reversed.</p><p>Eugene stopped by infrequently, and for short periods, not wanting to test the thin ice of their new friendship too often or too soon. But Eugene was finding to his surprise that George had plenty of intelligent things to say, although he was circumspect on behalf of his employer’s confidentiality. Morgan found, on more than one occasion, that he hadn’t realized he was talking to the hated Georgie Minafer, so thorough was the younger man’s transformation. And he supposed he had better get used to George’s presence, as his daughter didn’t show any indication of being willing to give him up a second time. </p><hr/><p>The orthopedic surgeon had apparently mistaken Fanny for being George’s mother; neither of them thought it necessary to disabuse him of the notion, and so it happened that Fanny was there to lend moral support when George was dealt the harshest blow of all.</p><p>The orthopedist was not encouraging and he didn’t mince words.  The left leg would heal, though it would be some time before it was able to bear weight, but the right leg was an unmitigated disaster. Both of the bones in the lower leg had been broken, one of them being a compound fracture, and there was nerve damage as well. Looking at the X rays, George was thankful he had been unconscious before they cut his trousers off in the ambulance, so he'd been spared <em> seeing </em> the jagged bone poking through his flesh. Still, he found the idea tremendously unnerving.  </p><p>George was told he shouldn’t expect to be back on his feet in anything less than eight or nine months, but more likely a year - if he were able to get back on his feet at all. And George was told to go ahead and excise the word ‘normal’ from his vocabulary right then and there. He’d need a crutch or more likely two, and he could expect to be in pain, for the rest of his life. That was it. The great surgeon was in and out of the room in less than five minutes, leaving George literally gasping for breath in his wake.</p><p>He could barely feel Fanny squeezing his hand, and he wasn’t entirely convinced that the room wasn’t spinning. In all of the financial turmoil they’d experienced, in the loss of almost everyone he loved, at least he had been able to rely on his physical strength. Now, at twenty-eight years old, it seemed that his life was over.</p><p>Fanny was looking at him like she was waiting for him to say something, so he attempted a feeble joke. “Well… I suppose it’s a good  thing our building has an elevator.”</p><p>Fanny did not laugh. “It’s all right if you want to cry, George,” she said, as kindly as she knew how. “I won’t think any less of you.”</p><p>He <em> did </em> want to cry, and it went on for quite some time. Fanny had fortunately come prepared with two handkerchiefs; as it turned out she had some tears to shed of her own. </p><p>“What,” George said eventually, “what are we going to do?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Fanny admitted. “I’ve been giving it some thought, and I have a few ideas, but nothing definite, yet.”</p><p>George shook his head. “It’s not your job - I don’t want you to worry -”</p><p>“<em> Let </em> me worry,” Fanny interrupted. “You’ve taken care of me admirably these last two years. I don’t mind doing the same for you.”</p><p>George was shaking, from both emotion and exhaustion. “I can’t allow you to-”</p><p>“Just for a little while. We’ll figure something out, I’m sure.” Fanny patted his cheek tenderly. "I signed up for a cooking class, you know." </p><p>George actually grinned at that, chuckled despite his pain and despair. "Oh, thank God." </p><p>"So you see, we're going to be just fine. Now get some rest, please. You’re no good to anyone worn out like this.”</p><p>Rest sounded good. It was practically the only comfort he had left. “All right.”</p><p>“I love you, Georgie.”</p><p>He nodded, eyes already sinking shut. “I love you, too.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Aunt Fanny is the only one who's allowed to call him 'Georgie' now, FIGHT ME.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>One afternoon, a week after the accident, Eugene came in; Lucy kissed her father on the cheek and departed. They had obviously discussed it beforehand - George hadn’t been alone with Eugene yet, but the older man took a seat and leaned forward with obvious purpose on his face. George’s mouth went suddenly dry; he was still a little bit afraid of Eugene Morgan, and figured he probably always would be.</p><p>"How are the legs?" Eugene opened.</p><p>"Still broken," George said dryly. "Shoulder's better, though." </p><p>"Ah. Yes, I see." The noted industrialist rubbed the back of his neck, awkward. </p><p>"But that's not why you came here," George prompted.</p><p>"No." Eugene relaxed perceptibly - the one thing he could do with confidence was talk shop. "I came to tell you that I paid a visit to my old friend Floyd Akers." </p><p>At 'my old friend' George's heart sank, in spite of himself. He hadn't known he'd been employed by anyone who knew Morgan - he remembered just in time that Morgan didn't hate him anymore. </p><p>"He showed me around the works - it's quite a going concern. I talked to some of the men - I saw your office -"</p><p>"It's not really an office," George protested, "just a desk and a few shelves." </p><p>"And I was asked, no fewer than seventeen times," Morgan went on, smiling, "if I'd visited you today, and if there's any way to know when you'd be back! The men are all at sixes and sevens without you, it seems. Even the horses are sulking."</p><p>"Oh, they'll have to get used to it," George said without thinking. "I'm sure he'll have my position filled long before the plaster comes off." </p><p>Morgan seemed surprised at this. "You don't think they'll still be wanting you?"</p><p>"Oh, maybe once I'm back on my feet again I can get hired to sweep the floors. But I don't flatter myself that I'm irreplaceable." George smiled, though his tone was bitter. </p><p>"Floyd didn't seem to think so," Morgan said, amused. "In fact, I could hardly get a word in edgewise." </p><p>"Really?"</p><p>"Oh, yes - he says there hasn't been an accident since you've taken over running things, and you've found a half-a-dozen ways to improve efficiency, and -" Morgan stopped. "Well, <em> you </em>know." He laughed at himself. "Akers told me you took a night course at Butler - what was it?"</p><p>George couldn't help the note of pride that crept into his voice. "Organic chemistry!"</p><p>“Well, you see, that’s where I think you can help me out.” Morgan made the comment casually, but George couldn’t imagine a world in which he served any purpose to Morgan. “I’ve been in conversation with Akers, and Carl Fisher, and several other interesting men, and we’ve got an ingenious idea we’re cooking up.”</p><p>“What is that, sir?”</p><p>“Auto racing!” Morgan chuckled, and slapped his knee. “Fisher has this idea that we can make Indianapolis the center of the racing industry - there are a lot of moving parts, of course, but I think he’s got the drive, so to speak, to make it work.”</p><p>“That sounds… interesting, sir.” George was baffled as to why Eugene Morgan would be sharing business plans with the likes of him.</p><p>“Anyway,”Morgan went on, “Akers and I are establishing an experimental laboratory - gasoline additives, rubber substitutes, that sort of thing. I’m more of a silent partner, you see, but Akers respects my opinion on matters of staffing - and I’d like you to run it.”</p><p>George blinked. “What?”</p><p>“Bring over whoever you’d like from the nitroglycerin works,” Morgan said. “It seems you’ve got quite a loyal following over there.”</p><p>“Well, sir, I don’t know what to say.”</p><p>“Call me Eugene,” the other man said with a smile. “And give it some thought; you don’t have to answer me right away.”</p><p>“I don’t mind admitting that it would be a tremendous weight off,” George said. “But perhaps Aunt Fanny hasn’t told you - the news regarding my legs is, ah, not encouraging.”</p><p>“Fanny told me,” said Morgan. “And I have every reason to believe we'll get you on your feet eventually.” George smiled ruefully, not appearing to share Morgan’s optimism. “But in the meantime? It will take some months to build the lab, and equip it, and so on. I’d need to bring you on early in a consultancy role, and you can do that from right here in the hospital, provided you feel up to it, of course. Now how does that sound?”</p><p>George felt suddenly dizzy with relief. It was the first good news he’d had in a while. “It sounds very good, sir. Ah, Mr. Morgan, sir.”</p><p>“I'll pay you the going rate for the industry, of course.”</p><p>“Not a penny more?”</p><p>Morgan grinned. “Not a penny <em> less.</em>” He offered his hand, and George shook it. "I'll have my assistant draw up some papers - no hurry, of course. Anyway, that wasn't the only thing I wanted to talk to you about."</p><p>"What else could there be?"</p><p>"Well, Lucy, of course." And there it was, thought George. The job offer was a bribe, or perhaps a threat. Eugene Morgan, it was said, drove a hard bargain. And he had every right to warn George off of his daughter.</p><p>George hadn't meant to fall in love with Lucy all over again. She had made it so easy, the companionable way she came and went as she pleased, the kiss she would drop on his cheek in greeting. It had been so pleasant, only an hour before, to doze while she held his hand and read aloud from a book of poems. She must have thought he was asleep, then, because she had turned his hand palm up and traced a finger over the calluses she found there. </p><p>It would make all the pain he had suffered so far seem like no more than a pin prick, to give her up; but give her up he must. He had no claim on her, he could only offer her a fraction of what she deserved. And he doubted Eugene's forgiveness extended as far as the things he wanted to do - the <em> kisses </em> he wanted to give Lucy -</p><p>George was so absorbed in his self-pitying reverie that he completely missed the chewing-out he assumed Morgan was giving him. Eugene noticed the younger man's distraction, and mercifully repeated himself without being asked.</p><p>"I said, I've been thinking lately of Lucy's mother. My, ah, my late wife." </p><p>That was not what George had expected. Rather a roundabout way to begin. "Sir?" </p><p>"Mary, her name was. Mary Lewis." </p><p>George didn't follow. "Yes, sir," he said as some reply seemed to be expected of him. </p><p>"Do you know, from the day I first laid eyes on her till the day I buried her was only seventeen months." </p><p>"I… I'm sorry to hear that?" </p><p>"All I can think now," Morgan went on, "all I can think is how much better she deserved than I ever gave her." </p><p>"I'm sure you weren't unkind to her… sir," George replied, remembering only at the last moment to tack on the honorific.   </p><p>"Perhaps not," Morgan agreed, "but I was so consumed with - well, I don't mind saying it, consumed with wishing she was someone else. And I think, in time, I would have come to love and respect her the way a husband ought. But time was not on our side, it seemed. She lived long enough to bring Lucy into the world, but she was dead three days later." </p><p>George nodded, silent. A chill ran over him, which was strange because a moment ago the room had felt uncomfortably hot. </p><p>"You see, George, I didn't <em> cherish </em> her. A wife deserves to be cherished, to be treasured, to be loved for who she is and not resented for who she isn't. And you see, George, I have this whole little speech prepared - have had it for years. Whatever young man is lucky to win my Lucy's heart - I was going to tell that young man, whomever he is, that Lucy should be the most important thing in all the world to him." </p><p>"I see, sir," George said, vaguely wondering what on earth this had to do with <em> him. </em>Also he was wondering why the room was spinning.</p><p>"And now, well, I find I don't need it. </p><p>"Oh no, sir, I'm not so conceited as to think -" He stopped, blinking. </p><p>Morgan looked at him strangely, and then did something neither one of them would have predicted a week before. He laid a practiced hand across George's brow - and withdrew it quickly. "My God, George, you're burning up." </p><p>George blinked, and said, "Tell father I'll be right in, I've got to stable Pendennis," and promptly threw up on himself. But Morgan had already gone to find a doctor.</p><hr/><p>“You aren’t supposed to be here,” said the nurse who came in and found Lucy. “He’s not allowed to have visitors.”</p><p>“I’ll keep that in mind,” said Lucy, making no attempt to leave. George had been ill for two days; he wasn’t delirious yet, but lethargic and miserable. Practical Lucy had cleared away the flowers and imported several electric fans. As usual, she was reading - this time to herself, as George couldn’t have been less interested.</p><p>“Are you his wife?” the nurse demanded. She was red-headed and broad-shouldered, and was secretly very fond of George.</p><p>“No.”</p><p>“His sweetheart, then?”</p><p>“Not exactly.”</p><p>“Hmph.” The nurse twisted her mouth wryly. “Could have fooled me.” Lucy was unconcerned. “Well then, since you’re here, I have to change that dressing.”</p><p>“What can I do?” Lucy said, marking her place in her book. “Will it hurt him very much?”</p><p>“It’s not pleasant,” said the nurse, and Lucy liked her straightforwardness. “Just keep him calm. He’s always better when you’re here, anyway.”</p><p>Between the two of them, they unbuttoned and removed a rough cotton shirt which was soaked with perspiration. Lucy had her first real sighting of the bandages, then, and did not find it especially comforting. “Should it be bleeding that much?”</p><p>“Sweat mixes with blood,” the nurse told her. “Looks worse than it really is.” George was evidently familiar with the routine; he hooked his right arm above his head, and turned slightly onto his left side. The nurse efficiently rolled away the bandages, and Lucy tried hard not to gasp. The long incision on his right side, partly healed, looked intolerably painful. Lucy remembered Fanny telling her how George had nearly bled to death in the ambulance; the surgeon had repaired his internal organs just in time. </p><p>George’s eyes were locked on Lucy's;  his breathing was ragged, and he was making little pained noises in the back of his throat. Lucy looked down, and realized she was squeezing his hand so tightly with both of hers that her knuckles were turning white. </p><p>George murmured something that Lucy didn’t quite understand. “What was that, sweetheart?” She thought he was going to be sick again, and cast about for a basin. </p><p>“ ‘S ugly,” he said. “Sorry you have to see it.”</p><p>Lucy laughed shakily. “Honestly, George, I’m just happy you’re alive.” She watched as the nurse applied fresh bandages, and helped thread his nerveless limbs into a clean shirt. </p><p>George tried gamely to fasten the buttons himself, but his shaking fingers wouldn't cooperate. </p><p>“Sorry,” George said again while Lucy was doing up his buttons. “I’m sorry about...” He furrowed his brow, trying to finish the sentence. Lucy thought she had never seen a human being look so pitiful. “All of this.”</p><p>“Don’t give it another thought,” Lucy said brightly, and within a few minutes George had fallen into a fitful sleep. Lucy tried to return to her book, but after looking at the same paragraph three times without comprehending a word of it she gave up.</p><p>Somehow the sight of that ugly gash on his torso brought it home in a way that the casts on his legs hadn’t: that George would never be the same again. Fanny had passed along the discouraging news from the orthopedist, but Lucy hadn’t brought it up in conversation and neither had he. </p><p>Lucy pictured George at eighteen: everything had come easily to him then, whether it was dancing or running and chasing or flying through the snow in a sled going much too fast. He had been so unconscious of his physical strength, taking it for granted as one does in one’s youth, and Lucy had loved him for his arrogance. It was a good thing, Lucy thought, that the mental change had come to him before the physical one; the George of old would have simply self-destructed if the present set of circumstances had been visited upon him before he had learned unselfishness and forebearance. </p><p>Still, it would be a challenge for them both. George would have pain as his daily companion, and Lucy, who was so used to having things her way, couldn’t solve the problem by any of her usual methods. It was a lot to take on, even for someone so determined as she. And yet, Lucy thought, taking a long look at the only man she had ever loved, there was nothing in the world that could dissuade her.</p><hr/><p>Lucy’s heart stopped when the phone rang at four in the morning; it had only begun beating again upon hearing that George was dangerously ill and apparently hallucinating, but still alive. She threw on her oldest and plainest dress of brown cambric - the one she wore when visiting tenements - and braided her hair in the car on the way over, Eugene Morgan himself at the wheel. Certainly, she was as far removed from the Lucy Morgan of the society pages as it was possible to be.</p><p>“If you don’t stop trying to get up, they’re going to tie you to the bed,” Lucy said in a low voice when he was at his most agitated. She’d spent the last half hour feeding him bits of ice on a spoon, but his temperature would not come down. Lucy was truly alarmed for the first time since she’d opened the paper to the news of his disaster. “You don’t want that, do you? Won’t you try and lie still?”</p><p>“The doors,” George said, looking through Lucy rather than at her. “It’s the – she’s in there, she can’t open –“</p><p>“What doors, George dear?”</p><p>“The library,” he answered, “the doors are shut and she can’t – she can’t get in!”</p><p>“Is she in the library?” Lucy asked. She was fairly positive who the ‘she’ was, but despaired of his realizing that the ‘she’ in his mind was no more!</p><p>“She’s calling to me,” George said, trying to push himself off the mattress, and failing. “I have to go to her.”</p><p> “Suppose,” Lucy said with a quavering chin, “suppose you stay here, and I go to her, instead?”</p><p>“I have to tell her-“ George plucked at Lucy’s sleeve, piteously weak. “I have to tell her-“ </p><p>“Yes,” Lucy encouraged, “I’ll pass the message along, if you’ll only lie still!” </p><p>“Tell her I’m sorry!” George said finally, and started to cry, and Lucy cried then, too. </p><p>She stayed until he fell asleep, and laid a hand against his tear-wet cheek, pressed a kiss to his burning forehead. "Come back to me, George," she said, so low the nurse couldn't hear her. "Come back."</p><hr/><p>“Miss?”</p><p>Lucy jerked awake with a gasp to find the red-headed nurse standing over her. “I wasn’t asleep,” she said breathlessly. Sunlight was streaming through the window, and George was motionless. “Is he-”</p><p>“Temperature’s ninety-nine and a half, miss, and falling.” Lucy breathed a sigh of relief; it was the first time in four days he’d been under a hundred. “He’ll be asleep for a good long time. You need to take care of yourself, Miss; you look terrible.”</p><p>Lucy stood up and stretched. The metal chair was possibly the least comfortable place she had ever rested. “You’ll call me when he wakes?”</p><p>“I will. But don’t be in a hurry.” The nurse looked her over critically. “Aren’t you Lucy Morgan?” Lucy nodded mutely. “Well, God bless you, miss. You’ve been a brick.”</p><p>Lucy was as good as her word. The groundskeeper at Crown Hill cemetery that afternoon saw a highly fashionable young woman enter the unfashionable quarter of the cemetery; she knelt at a particular grave and remained there for a good twenty or thirty minutes. And while the watcher was discreet enough not to approach within earshot, he noticed that she had cleared the grass around the headstone, and left behind a veritable garden of flowers.</p>
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